Welcome to Paws and Effect, a pet expert advice column penned by longtime Rover contributor and award-winning pet writer, Jen Reeder. From navigating squishy social scenarios and murky ethical territory to burning behavioral or moral questions about cats and dogs, Jen uses her years of experience and hard-earned instincts to find real solutions for real pet people.
Dear Jen,
I come from a city where there are trash cans at every bus stop and every block on main streets and it’s easy and convenient to toss bagged dog poop. I recently moved to a more suburban but still metropolitan city where there are trash cans at every other bus stop and no public cans at intersections. When walking my dogs, I will occasionally throw bagged poop into other people’s curbside garbage canisters when it’s trash day and I see their bin hasn’t been emptied yet. The other day, my friend, who has a large Bernedoodle, asked me if I ever got yelled at for doing this—nope, I said. But the next day, while my dog was peeing, someone came running out of their house and screamed at me to pick up my dog’s poop. My dog wasn’t pooping—but obviously this person didn’t want any unsolicited “deposits” anywhere close to her property.
Now that I’ve been yelled at, I’ve been feeling like I have to sneak and throw poop away. I will walk the poop home if there are no garbage day bins around, but now I’m wondering if there is “dog poop etiquette” about this—what is the right, communal way to deal with bagged dog poo?
Signed, The Poop Fairy
iStock/Radule Perisic
Dear Poop Fairy,
I’ll be honest: I’d never given this issue much thought before now. My family lives next to a giant dog-friendly condo complex, so I’m always excited when people pick up their dog’s poop instead of, say, smearing it on the sidewalk in front of my home. If poop bags go into my trash can, I’m cool with it.
So, I posted your question about poop bag etiquette on social media and it turns out my friends have THOUGHTS! There were about 100 comments within a few hours.
Responses were all over the place. A lot of my considerate dog people said they don’t leave it in other people’s cans because they don’t want to upset people without pets, but wouldn’t mind if someone left poop bags in their own cans—as long as the bag was tied, and not in the recycling or compost bin, where they’d have to fish it out. A New Yorker carries a little backpack for full bags of poop on longer walks with her dog, and a Colorado hiker carries them in a portable trash can called a Dog Doo Tube.
Still, many friends don’t like poop bags in their trash cans because the bags break, or smell up their garbage can—especially in summer heat—or attract bugs or animals. One lost respect for a neighbor after watching her leave a bag of poop in a can just two houses from her own home.
Others think if a trash can is on the street waiting for garbage collection, it’s fair game (but never in an empty bin). One friend thought it was fine to use other people’s cans until she saw how many neighbors were complaining about it on the social media site Nextdoor. Another stopped doing it because of a hot debate in her neighborhood’s Facebook group.
Everyone seems to agree that people who leave a bag of poop on a trail or sidewalk claiming, “I’ll pick it up later” are rude—and people who don’t bother picking up poop at all are the worst. Photo credit: Jen Reeder
Everyone seems to agree that people who leave a bag of poop on a trail or sidewalk claiming, “I’ll pick it up later” are rude—and people who don’t bother picking up poop at all are the worst.
Then there’s the friend who wrote simply, “This is the dumbest argument ever.”
While dog poop etiquette is a “dirty” topic, it’s extremely important for dog lovers to discuss it—and to never leave a bag of poop in a private trashcan, according to Beth Cherryholmes Miller, founder of Wagtown, a nonprofit that helps communities become more dog friendly.
Beth Cherryholmes Miller founded the nonprofit Wagtown to help make communities across the U.S. “authentically” dog friendly. Photo courtesy of Beth Cherryholmes Miller
Part of what goes into making a community truly dog friendly is making residents welcoming to dogs, and Miller feels strongly that irresponsible dog owner behavior—including “feces management” (or the lack thereof)—is the top deterrent to her efforts.
“If you think it’s gross enough that you don’t even want to carry it home, then it’s probably too gross to throw in your neighbor’s trash can,” she told me when I shared your question. “And I think dog poop in general has a more adverse effect on the person who doesn’t have dogs than the person who does. The poop itself holds an entirely different meaning for them.”
Plus, if a bag breaks or isn’t tied tightly enough and the poop gets over everything, it can spread disease or attract rodents, flies, and parasites like fleas—which can also carry diseases, of course.
Some local governments even have laws against tossing trash like dog poop into other people’s trash cans or dumpsters. It can even be considered “theft of services” in areas where residents pay to have their garbage taken away.
BigDuckSix via iStock
Proper poop disposal, Miller says, is paramount to creating communities where people and dogs can happily coexist.
“When there’s a responsible person at the end of the leash, that’s when positive change happens,” she advised.
So, Poop Fairy, thank you for raising this eye-opening question. I hope that you and every dog lover will do your part to help our communities become more dog friendly by picking up our pets’ poop—and only throwing it away in public cans or at home. Thanks to you, I will, too!
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